How to play like a champion today

If you want to know what makes an athlete elite, watch Micah Parsons and Josh Jacobs play football.

They each move with the kind of intensity that can lift an entire team if its members are paying attention.

Watch Micah Parsons bounce off a pair of blockers, spin around and drive back toward quarterback Jacoby Brissett. His eyes stay laser focused on his target and he brushes off perfectly capable linemen like cobwebs, inconveniences that barely break his stride.

Take a close look at Josh Jacobs and the relentless way his legs pick up steam as the game clock winds down. Watch him carry the pile as he fights to stretch inches into yards and yards into touchdowns.

It isn’t so much their fundamentals that catch your eye — though they’ve each mastered necessary skillsets like timing, footwork and field vision. It’s the passion with which they play the game, that steel look in their eyes, their absolute will to win.

They don’t say it, but at certain points during the game, it seems like both Parsons and Jacobs would willingly strap their teammates on their backs and yank them along.

Let’s go! They scream with their play. Get it done.

Seasons roll by quickly, especially in the Not For Long league.

If you want to win a ring, you have to do it now, while the clock is running, while you still have a little bounce in your step.

I watch Micah and Josh play and I think every young athlete, regardless of their sport, should treat themselves to some game film. Rewind it and study the look in their eyes.

Watch how effort matters more than anything else.

See what happens when you barrel that hard toward your dreams.